Is Civility Lost? When Did Compromise Become a Dirty Word? Finding Common Ground in a Fractured Society

Start

Thursday, June 22, 2017

End

Saturday, June 24, 2017

Location

Washington, DC

The sights, sounds and experiences of the entire weekend were captured in this video summary. Check it out!

Our Friday night Fireside Chat dinner at the National Archives featured Dr. Jim Mullen, President of Allegheny College, and Amy Walter, National Editor, The Cook Political Report. Click here to watch!

Since the founding of our country, we have consistently experienced periods of civil unrest - whether fighting for control over territories, fighting against the monarch, fighting for equal rights and free speech, fighting a foreign enemy, or fighting for air time. The tension in our political and social climate is regrettable and feels like it is at an all-time high – but is it the new normal?

Is uncivil discourse entwined so deeply in our nation’s culture that we must accept it? Attendees will have a chance to decide for themselves while walking the halls of the U.S. Capitol where political arguments were once settled by blood-filled duals, pondering in the Library of Congress where literature tells us how to live by the Golden Rule, touring the Smithsonian’s new National Museum of African American History and Culture where an untold journey awaits us, walking the estate of Mount Vernon where George Washington, our only non-partisan president, orchestrated the planning of our federal city, and scanning the intentions of our founding fathers in the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights and the Constitution as we privately dine in the National Archives.

You will be educated, inspired and challenged by elected officials, historians, journalists, social media experts and civic leaders. We hope you and your family will depart our nation’s capital motivated to make respectful discourse part of our republic’s identity.

“Happiness and Moral Duty are Inseparably Connected” – George Washington